I picked up my ten cards and looked down at the King of Clubs.
“Since I dealt, you go first. If you need that card, take it and discard. If you don’t need that card, flip over. You can’t have more than ten cards in your hand at once, but you can have less.”
“So if I have any of the needed combinations, can I put them down?” I asked.
“Yep. The goal is to run out of cards.”
“Can I discard cards onto your piles?”
“No. That’s a different game I can teach you tomorrow night.”
“Fair enough,” I said, with a smile. “Then I’ll take that card and do this.”
I set down three Kings before taking a card and laying it down.
“I don’t flip one over, right?” I asked.
“Nope. And now it’s my turn. Thank you for that card, by the way. I needed it.”
“How did you end up learning so many card games?”
He shrugged as he put down three Aces.
“I spent a lot of time alone as a child. I played a lot of card games by myself during long summer days.”
“You didn’t have anyone to play with?” I asked.
He shook his head and my heart broke for him.
“One summer, I got a book about card games from the library to learn more about them. Playing card games against myself got boring quickly, so I needed new games to learn.”
We played a couple of rounds in silence and I wondered what his childhood must have been like. I knew Anton took him in, and I’d seen the pictures of him looking young, starved and badly bruised. My eyes t
raveled his body as he laid down cards and picked them up, studying them closely as his tongue darted out over his bottom lip. I wondered what the child growing inside of me might mean to him. And slowly, some of his concerns dropped into place. He didn’t want his child struggling the way he had. He didn’t want his child to be without loving parents, like he was.
I began to see him through a different lens. One not clouded by anger and resentment. And I began to appreciate Gray and all of what he had accomplished despite the turmoil that had ravaged his childhood.
“Your turn,” he said.
Shaking my head, I pulled myself from my thoughts as we continued the game. We played through four rounds, and it wasn’t a shocker that he won each of them. But the food settled hard in my stomach and the hot water around my calves relaxed me a little too much. Gray helped me up from the side of the in-ground hot tub and he led me back to the house, arm in arm until he guided me to my bedroom door.
“Get some sleep,” he said.
Then, he bent down and kissed my forehead.
I watched him walk off, studying him as he turned a corner and his shadow grew smaller. I stripped myself of my clothes and piled into bed, my eyes gazing out the window. I laid there all night, in and out of sleep, wondering about Gray and thinking about how much I wanted him. Admitting how badly I wished things were different between us. My mind began to wander and my dreams followed suit. I saw him holding my hand as I gave birth, and kissing me on the lips afterwards. I saw me moving my stuff upstairs and sleeping in his room with him. And every time I jerked myself awake from those torturous dreams, I started hoping.
Which was a bad thing when it came to Gray.
Did I dare hope for something between us? Did I dare look towards a future and consider the fact that he might want me back? Was it possible for us to move past this politeness to a place of love and trust with one another?
The lingering hope was enough to show me how badly I wanted it to happen.
I woke up on that Monday morning to Gray rapping lightly at my door. He pushed it open and stood there in a beautiful button-front shirt and a pair of dark wash jeans. I turned over and sighed, my eyes taking him in as he leaned against the doorway.
“Your first prenatal visit is in a couple of hours. I figured you might want to get up and shower beforehand,” he said.
“Mmm, thanks,” I said.